Pacific cleaner shrimp
Amazing fact
The Pacific cleaner shrimp rocks from side to side to signal to fish that it is ready to clean them.
Aquarium of the Pacific
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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
The Pacific cleaner shrimp rocks from side to side to signal to fish that it is ready to clean them.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Pacific cleaner shrimp
- Scientific name
- Lysmata amboinensis
- Japanese name
- アカシマシラヒゲエビ
- Group
- Ocean animals
- Class
- Malacostraca
- Order
- Decapoda
- Family
- Lysmatidae
- Genus
- Lysmata
It crawls over the bodies of fish such as moray eels and groupers, eating leftover bits of food and parasites.
How the Pacific cleaner shrimp lives
The larvae hatch around dusk and begin drifting in the water. While drifting in the water, they eat other plankton. They grow through repeated molts, then settle on the bottom and change form. They begin as males and gain both male and female functions after repeated molts.
Aquarium of the PacificBasic data
- Diet
- Food scraps, parasites, and other material
- Range
- Indo-Pacific, Caribbean Sea, and Moluccas
Where the Pacific cleaner shrimp has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- アカシマシラヒゲエビ
- 简体中文
- 清洁虾
- 繁體中文
- 安波鞭腕蝦
- 한국어
- 예쁜줄무늬꼬마새우
- Français
- Crevette-barbier d'Amboine
- Italiano
- Gamberetto pulitore giallorosso
- ไทย
- กุ้งพยาบาล
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 鳥羽水族館 — アカシマシラヒゲエビChecked: 2026-11-04
- Aquarium of the Pacific — Pacific Cleaner ShrimpChecked: 2026-11-07
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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